Black Jack
by prettylittledemigod
Summary: Piper helps the FBI in Sacramento, to find a serial killer working by the name Black Jack. Here, Piper finds love and friends, but what happens when she falls in a dangerous relationship? Will she find Black Jack before he finds her? Rating might change.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey guys it's prettylittledemigod, this is my new fic, hopefully it would be longer. It is about Piper, I really do not know who should I pair her up with. There's Jason, Malcom and even Nico who will appear eventually. I do not own any of the characters or any ideas from The Mentalist. The Mentalist is owned by the owner of The Mentalist, who is not me, the characters are Rick Riordan's creation.**

* * *

Piper was driving a new Porsche her father, the famous Tristan McLean had gifted her on her 16th birthday, she remembered that birthday, he was not there, instead, his assistant Jane was in front of their house with a silver Audi, the latest edition, and a sick excuse for her father's absence. Now she was shifting from Los Angeles to Sacramento. She sighed as she recalled her reason for shifting.

 _The phone rang, Piper picked it up._

 _"Hello?" Piper asked._

 _"Good morning, this is agent Chase from the F.B.I., am I talking to Piper McLean?" a 20 something year old guy's voice asked.  
_

 _"Ah...the F.B.I., been a long time since I've heard from you guys, and yes, this is her." Piper was chuckling on the inside.  
_

 _"Miss, agent Zhang has requested your help for the recent Black Jack case."_

 _"Black Jack...never heard of it."_

 _"Of course, the F.B.I. has not released any details to the media. Our head, agent Zhang wants you working on this case, he has talked to your guardian and he agrees to let you shift to our base at Sacramento."_

 _"Excuse me? Zhang talked to my dad without even asking me? IS HE GONE MAD?". Agent Chase sighed and answered,"They told me that you are going to be a handful." his tone changed and became more formal as he said,"We have taken care of the requirements put up by Tristan McLean, you would be done shifting by tomorrow, you will start school over here by Monday as a cover." he must've expected some reaction on the school part, but Piper answered with sarcasm dripping in her voice,"I'd love to put my ass on line to find an unknown criminal responsible for sexual assaults and murder of 54 brunettes" he interrupted with a sudden 'How do you know bout it?'_

 _Piper smirked and answered,"The FBI does not give information, but hacking, oh sorry, 'accidentally stumbling' into Zhang's email sure does."_

 _"Give me a reason to not arrest you for invading the privacy of an FBI officer."_

 _"Cause you all need me, officer, admit it , your little FBI team would still not be close to solving those 10 serial killer's cases without me."_

 _"Agreed, I'm new but my team mates told me about you and your achievements."_

 _"Then I'll be there, but I'd be new and need your help to settle down, officer. Hope you will help me.". Agent Chase flirted back and said,"Fine, then meet me tomorrow, the address will be given in a short while, you just need to bring your personal things."_

 _"K."_

* * *

Piper reached the place, her 'home' for some time. The real reason she agreed to help was that she had nothing to do in her life, school went on, she had no social life, not that she needed one, and life at home was nothing. Her dad was never there, mother died when Piper was 5, and Jane was always sucking up to her dad. She was thankful her dad did not remarry, that would be one problem on it's own. There were a few reasons Piper was not a people person, first being her dad. He did handle the fame well but was never home and did not spend time with her, making her hate the fame. The second reason was that she did not spend much time at one place, she always had to shift from one place to another. Till now, most of Piper's friends were FBI agents, and she wasn't even half their age.

Agent Chase came over in the evening, Piper studied him, he was cute _._ Not even old, he was in his early twenties."Hi Piper, how are you?"he asked. "I'm fine, just thinking about putting some things at their places, are you free?". He analyzed the boxes with his stormy grey eyes, they were not many."I had to meet my little sister, she's going to the same school as your's, but it can wait."Piper smiled and added,"Thanks a lot, agent". They chatted. Piper got to know a lot about him, his name was Malcom Chase, he had a sister of her age, Annabeth, he liked jazz music and reading. He told her about the neighborhood, restaurants and cafes. Piper told him about her cases with agent Stoll, and his pranks on agent Zhang. Later, Malcom got a call from his sister, and he said he had to rush and left. He gave her a few files on the case before leaving. At night Piper read the files, then called her dad. As usual, it went to voicemail. Piper sighed, then started blasting Panic! At the Disco on her phone. She fixed herself a PBJ sandwich, smiling as she did. Memories surfaced, she remembered the outings on her dad's private beaches, the picnics on a blanket and snorkeling. She remembered that she had to go to school the next day, and went to bed.

The next morning Piper was woken up by Rachel's call. She was another agent with Frank Zhang who knew about her."Hey Piper! How are you?"she asked, Piper answered with a "I'm fine Dare. Why did you call me at this time?". Rachel chuckled at her tone and answered,"I had to tell you that I'd be dropping and picking you to and from school." Piper muttered"Right...". After dressing up for school, Piper checked her phone to see a message _from her dad,_ her heart skipped a beat. She read it-

 _How are you Pipes?_

 _I have sent you some money to spent in Sacramento, I am proud of you. Stay safe._

 _-Love, Tristan._

As Piper entered the school, she saw Annabeth. That blonde was kinda hard to miss, she was like Malcom's female version. She had princess-like curls which reminded Piper of Cinderella. She was pretty, her calculating grey eyes were searching for somebody as she stood on the steps. A messy black haired, green eyed handsome guy had his right arm around her waist protectively. He had a skateboard tucked under his left arm. Piper approached them and said, "Hello Annabeth, I'm Piper, I think u were looking for me." Annabeth frowned and asked "How do you know my name?"Piper pointed to the Starbucks' latte in the blondie's hand, Anna let out a small,"Oh..."and her mouth turned into a genuine smile."Well, I'm the head of Goode's welcoming community, and the seaweed brain here, is my boyfriend, Percy Jackson." He was the typical troublemaker, she saw how they were perfect for each other. Annabeth showed her around and then dropped her in trigonometry for the blonde girl made her promise that she would sit with her at lunch. When Piper entered she saw that the only eat empty was next to a blond guy, Piper went to him and asked,"Uh...can I sit here?"the guy looked up, he had the most handsome face she had ever seen, striking blue eyes, and a small scar above his upper lip, he said,"Yeah sure."Piper smiled, he smiled back a sweet and cute smile, it made Piper's heart flutter. _Wait what?_ Piper sighed and sat down,"So... What's your name? Mine's Jason." Piper smiled and answered him. They started talking, when Piper said that she was weak in trigo, Jason offered his help. He was a sweet and caring guy, and funny too. As soon as Piper got to know that he could play a guitar, she said,"Let maths go to hell, and teach me how to play a guitar." Jason started laughing at that. By the end of the lesson Piper was proud to notice that with Jason's help tangent and sine had started to make sense to Piper. Piper did not miss all the wide-eyed stares she got from the guys, but she did not obsess over them as well. Never would Piper ever admit that she was pretty. Which she was, very much. She had choppy brown hair, a beautiful face and lovely olive colored skin. The most breathtaking feature of her's were her eyes, they changed color, from chocolate, to blue,to emerald green, tangerine and many more. All this made her the talk of every school she went to.

In the lunch period, Piper saw Annabeth sitting with Percy, Thalia, a girl from her history class and Jason's sister (Piper hypothesized that as they had the same eyes and cheekbones), Grover, Percy's best friend and of course,Leo Valdez the annoying Santa's Latino elf from her calculus class who insisted on calling her 'beauty queen' (at that time Piper wished she had Agent Dare's gun). As soon as Piper approached them, every one of them said or in Leo's case shouted,"Hey Piper."As soon as they realized that they had chorused it, they burst out laughing. A couple of other tables joined them. After the lunch Piper got a message from Malcom saying that a new scene of crime had turned up and that he would pick her up from school, instead of Rachel.

At the end of the day, Piper made her way to Malcom's car. Her day at school was better from other first days, except the stupid threat she got from the Drew something girl. Drew had told her to 'keep her un-manicured hands off her Jasie-poo.' Piper was literally rolling on the floor, laughing. She told Malcom about her day at school, when they reached there,Frank said,"The victim is Bianca DiAngelo .She died..."That was when Piper stopped listening, Piper saw a joker's hat inside an ace on the wall made with dried blood. After examining the body, Piper said, to no one in particular,"Take me to Bianca's bone doctor." Malcom asked,"How do you even know that she has one?" Piper answered, "Trust me, I do."

* * *

 **I decided on leaving it here, what do u think happens at the clinic? even I dont know, well we can always find out in the next update...**

 **P.S. Does any one want me to continue? If u do, then wat pairing do u want? Tell me by reviews.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

Frank Zhang walked back in his office and sat down. His team had dug out some really interesting clues today, he was glad to have Piper working with them. Even though she was a pain in the ass, she got things done. Plus the new agents in his team were warming up to her too. Agent Chase then knocked and stood by the open door, and said, "Sir, we all are done for the day, some of us were going to the new pizza place, I wanted to ask if you would like to come."

Frank replied almost immediately,"No, Chase, I had to meet my wife for dinner, we are having over our son Sammy too. But why don't you ask Piper?" Malcolm nodded and said, smiling a bit, "Yes sir, Agent Dare already did, they seem to be quite good friends."

"Why, yes, Agent. Piper's almost become family to Rachel and me. Oh, Hazel sometimes even calls her our daughter." Zhang said, chuckling. He then added after a few seconds, "You live near her place, don't you Macolm? Why don't you two stop by for dinner someday, Hazel's half-brother, Nico would be coming-" He was cut off by an amused Piper, who had just stormed into his office and was looking around. "Nico DiAngelo is coming? And you didn't even tell me? Zhang, seriously! Oh, and just cause you gave me this information does NOT mean that I'm over the fact that you called my dad, and oh," She then turned towards Malcolm, who had an eyebrow raised and was staring at her, surprised that she just walked in and started speaking, it would take a while for him to adjust to her behavior, she continued, "By the way, Chinese isn't going to walk to us on chopsticks. And Dare is literally starving! We need to go!"

Malcolm smiled, Piper acted like a sweet and annoying little kid sometimes, but he saw an extremely different face of hers when she worked, she was quite serious with her investigation. The two left the cabin to join the others downstairs, as soon as they got inside the elevator, Piper burst out, "Seriously though, how are you able to put up with Zhang? He's so annoying! Half the time he's keeping information from you, and that too really, really important information! If I would've known Ghost King's coming-" Malcolm cut her rant, asking, "Ghost king?" Piper chuckled and said, "Oh yeah, Ghost King! My sweet little Nicokins! A long, long time ago, child, I was a little girl of 6 and he was 8, we were neighbors and we used to play together. I used to be Persephone and he was Hades, and we used to speak in Greek, it was fun."

"So, are you two close even now?"

She grinned again, and said, "No, not that much, now that he's in grade 12 he has lots of studying to do, but he did come to visit me once, though." Malcolm nodded, they reached the ground floor and got out of the elevator, where the Stolls and Rachel were waiting. "What took you two so long? Were you with Frank or in the janitor's closet making babies?"

Malcolm's eyes widened, whereas Piper simply smirked and said, "Oh, don't worry Dare, if I get pregnant, I promise you'll be the godmother, happy? Now lets go, don't want to keep the baby starving, now do we?" Just for an extra effect, she rubbed her belly. The Stolls snickered and Rachel sighed, shaking her head.

-X-

"Guys, what do you all want? I'm ordering."

There was a change in the plans, they were all at Piper's place, because she wanted them to come over and stay with her, to catch up properly. When she was asked by Chase what 'properly' meant, Piper said that it involved loads of cheese pizza, shouting at the Stolls, and him doing her homework.

At the current moment, Piper was sprawled on the floor, frowning at her assignment which she had gotten as homework for AP maths, _how the hell did I get AP maths?_ But oh, she had already gone over the stupid topic with Jason, the sweet guy in her class. Malcolm was studying her with a smile on his face as she bent over the sheet and read the questions, all her hair falling in her face. The Stolls were at the Foosball table they had discovered in the basement. How it got there, Piper had no idea.

At the mention of food, she looked up from the damned sheet and smiled at Dare with big, bright blue eyes. "A big, cheesy pizza! With extra cheese, and olives, and cheese, and mushrooms, and oh, did I mention cheese?"

Rachel rolled her eyes, but nodded anyways. Surprisingly, or not so surprisingly, the twins had heard her in the basement and were running up the staircase. "A pepperoni and cheese pizza!" One of them shouted, "And a barbecue chicken pizza!" the other shouted, Dare sighed, she wondered how they became officers with such behavior. "And you, Chase?" She asked, Malcolm spoke, "Something with mushroom and olives would do."

Piper glanced up from her worksheet which she was cursing a couple of minutes back, and smirked at him, with a crazed look in her eyes, "You see Chase, you cannot run away from the power of mushrooms and olives, it drags you in, and then you can never escape, never." The two brothers once again started laughing. Even Rachel managed to crack a smile.

After 30 torturing minutes of trignometry, the pizza came.

 _Ding dong!_

"I'll get it!" Piper shouted, she wanted to fly away from homework to pizza land. She opened the door and saw... Leo?

"Leo?"

"Beauty queen?"

Her eyes brightened, "Hey, Leo! And, oh, if you want to have kids, do not call me that."

She knew Leo from her Chemistry class, and he was sitting with Annabeth at the lunch table, that morning. He was funny, and cool.

"So... It's a nice place, your house, I mean. You live here with your family?"

Piper slid out her wallet and took out the money, then she looked at him, and said,"Uh, yeah, I live with my dad, but, he's gone out for work." She gave him the money and took the 5 huge pizza boxes in her hands, she was able to handle then well, even Leo had some problem doing that.

"So... You wouldn't ask me why I'm doing a part time job?" He asked her. Usually people did, and then they'd stay away from him. This was the reason he didn't have many friends like Jason or Percy. Piper knew that this was a difficult topic for him, his eyes said that, so instead she replied, "No, but I will ask how did you make that helicopter fly during Chem. It was so cool!"

Leo was surprised, he was about to answer, but Malcolm appeared from behind Piper, and asked, "Seriously Piper, are you making the pizzas here?" Even before Piper had a chance to respond, Leo spoke, "Hey, wait, aren't you wise girl's elder brother? The one working in law enforcement?"

"Uh..." Piper started.

He then looked at Leo, and said, "You're one of Annabeth's friends, right? The one who works at the mechanic shop nearby?" Leo just frowned, and nodded. After looking at the two of them for some time, Leo asked, "What are you guys doing together? Are you like... Dating? And does Annie know?"

Piper shook her head, and lied smoothly, "No, no, we aren't dating. We have some mutual friends, and since I'm new around, and he lives nearby, we were just hanging out and he was telling me about the restraunts around." Leo nodded, convinced, he said, "Alrighty, then I guess I'll see you around tomorrow at school?"

Piper nodded and they went in. Malcolm turned towards her and asked, taking a few of the boxes from her, "How are you able to lie so smoothly?" She kept the pizzas on the table and said, "The human mind first searches for changes in the voice, does statement analysis to detect deception, and then it tends to read the facial expressions and body language. You simply need to control your reflex actions, the minute, sudden ones, like the eye movement... And I'll give you a proper speech on how to control your reactions when tied up to a lie detector, or while giving a polygraph, but you don't need to know my tricks, agent. Besides, I'm hungry AF. Into the land of pizza, now!"

! #$%^&*()_++_)(*&^%$# ! #$%^&*()_++_)(*&^%$# ! #$%^&*()_++_)(*&^%$# ! **A LINE BREAK.**! #$%^ &*()_++_)(*&^%$# ! #$%^&()_++_)(*&^%$# !

The next morning, Piper woke up early. She grabbed an apple, stuffed her books inside her bag, and walked out of the door. It was early, school didn't start till half an hour later, _then what the hell am I doing here, leaving my boyfriend, Mr. Warm Cosy Bed?_ She asked herself, she could take her car, but when she looked at the sky, she saw that the weather was pleasant and shrugged, walking wouldn't kill her. It was the second day, she had memorized the route to school last day only. She liked to be prepared for stuff.

Entering the school building, she saw Annabeth talking to Percy, or rather, Annabeth scolding Percy. She chuckled at the scene in front of her. Annabeth noticed her, and smiled, "Hey! Piper, good morning!" Smiling, Piper made her way to the couple, it felt odd, a funny feeling appeared in her chest, someone of her age wanted to talk to her, she was finally making friends, _and they weren't colleagues who talked about murderers or rapists or revolvers or semi automatics... though those semi automatic pistols were so cool!_

Returning to the real world, Piper smiled at the two and said, "Good morning!" Percy smiled back, and said, "Morning! Hey, so, did something happen between you and Leo last night? He called me and started ranting about you, pizza, Malcolm -who by the way is wise girl's brother- and your coolness." The brunette smiled as he brought Leo up. She was about to say something, when the Latino elf himself came running and interrupted them.

"I heard the word coolness, so I just wanted you all to know, that if you search the word 'coolness' on Google, you would see your very own McShizzle's photo, or... no. Wait, I'm not cool. No. Never. I'm soooo not cool. I'm hot. Extremely hot. I'm-"

"Fine, Leo. We get it. Now I'm getting late for class so we should... Oh, Piper, uh, hi." Jason said, the two hadn't noticed each other until now. Apparently, Leo had dragged him with himself to the group. _Wow, group, and I'm kind of a part of it..._ Piper mentally smiled as she realized this, maybe coming over here wasn't that bad, _maybe after the case was over she could stay over here, surely, her dad won't disagree, and-_

"Uh, hello? Hello from the other side? Earth to Beauty Queen?"

 _Beauty Queen._

This was enough to get her out of her trance, she frowned and smacked Leo's arm, hard.

"OW! WOMAN! THAT HURT!"

Everyone around them burst out laughing. The bell rang, and students started to file out. Annabeth dragged Percy behind herself, towards their class, saying, "I need to get early to the class. I need to maintain my GPA to get to an Ivy League college. And studying a bit won't harm you either, Percy." As their backs disappeared into the sea of teenagers, Piper turned her head and saw Jason smiling at her. When he knew that had her attention, he asked, "So, we have trig, can we walk to class together?"

Piper shrugged and nodded.

"So, Leo told me that you live around here, near Annabeth's house. Is that true?"

"Yup. We live nearby."

"And you know Malcolm?'

"Yup We have friends who know each other, though why are you asking?"

"Oh, just like that. Leo was speaking a lot about you last night. Percy called me at 11 in the night to warn me that Leo would call, but I missed it and thus ended up staying up staying till four in the morning."

"Oh god. Leo!" Piper facepalmed, and spoke from between her hands.

Jason chuckled. Piper asked him, "So, in all those five hours of speech on the topic 'Piper: The Cool Girl', what did you learn about me?"

"Well, I learned that you are a really awesome person, who, and I quote, on the scale of awesomeness, is a 9, not a 10 because Leo is the 'awesomest' person alive." This caused Piper to laugh, they reached the classroom, but when Piper was about to get into the classroom, Jason grabbed her hand and made her turn towards him, so that they were face to face, with barely an inch between them.

"But above all I learnt that you're a caring person. Leo needs a good friend. He's got no one except me or Percy. All he needs is a friend who is with him throughout the time. These days we've been neglecting him, I've been focusing on studies and Percy is spending more time with Annabeth. He likes you like a friend. I hope you'll be his."

Piper smiled, he sure did care a lot about Leo. She nodded, and turned her attention to the kids sitting in their were staring at the two with their jaws dropped, the teacher wasn't in the classroom yet. While going towards her seat, Piper was about to pass Drew who was glaring daggers at her and she immediately knew what was about to come. She stepped lightly on the orange 'tanned' leg that was in 100 inches high heels which was out to trip her. She carefully avoided the bone, and used just the force to make her grab her foot and let out a shriek.

She casually walked to Jason, who was now in his seat, and slid beside him. It was when Drew started shouting profanities like a mad woman that the teacher decided to enter. She ignored Drew, and spoke, "I hope all of you did that assignment I gave you. I want you all to hand it over to me after the class."

Piper grinned as she remembered that she had finished it all last night. "Class, that was the basics, today we will start with-"

 _Piper McLean is requested to report to the Principal's office. I repeat, Piper McLean is requested to report to the Principal's office._

Jason's eyes turned from the teacher towards her. She groaned, "Zhang!"


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

"You better be having a good reason and some choco chip cookies if you have the guts to come here, unannounced, and disturb my class. I even finished the godforsaken assignment! And mind you, that was a _maths_ assignment, and we're even starting new-" Piper went off as soon as the principal left the room, giving them some privacy to talk.

"There were two more bodies found, though this one is different than the others." Zhang spoke gravely. Piper stopped in her tracks, and frowned.

" _One."_

She pondered on his words, and her eyes widened.

" _Merde_. No. That can't be. Two women, together?" He nodded, "Agent Chase is already at the scene, along with the Stolls, they're talking to the parents of the desceased twins. Agent Dare is in the car, she'll take you there, and brief you on the way. If you need anything, pevious files, crime scene pctures, anything at all, don't hesitate to ask anyone of them, or even me, though I have to be in a meeting in an hour or so."

She could see how desperate he was, his eyes said so, his voice said so. It was not that he wanted the burden of this case off him, he wanted the killings to stop. It was driving everyone over the edge. _If all this crap somehow got to the media..._ Piper shuddered at the thought. Whole of Sacramento would fall apart.

-X-

"Oh good, Pipes, you're here. This is Mrs. Julia Robinson, and Mr. Patrick Robinson, the parents. They were out at the time of the murder. And this is Eric Cavanaugh, Summer Robinson's boyfriend. He was the one who found the two sisters dead in their room." She looked at the parents, who were all dressed up as if coming from a formal party.

Piper studied the guy in front of her, he was about 16.

 _Around the two sisters's age. The two sisters's who were murdered at the age of 16._ Shaking her head, she studied Eric's hands, he had a callus on his middle finger. He had a disturbed look on her face, almost as if he was touched emotionally by the deaths, obviously, but there was something else prominent too. She had seen that look many a times on Jane's face, especially when Piper had either intentionally or unintentionally sabotaged Tristan's press conferences, the look was of disappointment.

"So, Eric, I take it that you were writing a book on Summer? Or... No, not on your girlfriend, but on her sister. Right? That would answer the question as to why the flowers are there." Piper paused and glanced at Conner, who looked troubled because she had just entered and she had gotten out more that he had in just a few seconds.

"Giving a girl a white tulip is basically begging her to take you back after you've slept with her twin. It symbolizes forgiveness, and purity, too, but I guess that's not the case here, right?" She smirked, and then continued, "Every girl likes white tulips, so do I. Thank you." He blinked a few times and stared at her as she slid her hand in his front pocket and took a single flower dried out, alongside a neatly pressed note.

She opened it. Her eyes wandered over it, and quietly, she stepped out of his way and went towards the stairs. "Uh, Piper? What's in the note? Is it related to the case? We need to see it, it could be considered evidence." Piper stopped in her tracks, turned around, and spoke to Conner. "Trust me when I say it isn't evidence. Oh, and, Mr. and Mrs. Robinson? Where were you when the two were killed?" At that question, the mother burst into tears and buried her face into her husband's shirt.

Mr. Robinson spoke gravely, "We were at a gallery of an old friend."

Piper shuddered on the inside at the thought of dressing up in the morning and going to a boring art gallery. Well, she was a kid at heart, she got bored doing adult stuff.

Doing adult stuff... _Okay. I don't have a childlike mind. I have a dirty one. An extremely dirty one_ , she thought _._

"Oh, and didn't the two have school today? And you also, Eric?" She asked, raising an eyebrow at him.

"I was going but I had to deliver the note and the, uh... flower."

Mrs. Robinson cleared her throat, and spoke, "Briana was sick, so Summer planned to stay and look after her. Things had been cold between the two lately, but still, Summer was looking after her sister. So I let her stay, I was glad that they were finally making up, but..." She broke into another cry, and then continued, "Oh, I shouldn't have done that! I shouldn't have let them stay at home, Patrick! I-"

Piper winced, she hated this part. Eying Dare -who was making Eric sign some stuff- she quickly went up the stairs, to Malcolm and Travis.

The first thing she saw when she entered was the sign, made with dried blood. "So, where are the bodies... _oh."_ She took in the bodies, both of them were lying on the bed. She studied the faces, they were about her age, and this fact was haunting her ever since the start of the case _._ Malcolm noted her distress, he knew what she was worrying about. "This one is Brianna and the other one is Summer. I think you met her-"

He was cut off by Piper, who asked, "Do you have a suit?"

Malcolm blinked, and then thought if she were kidding him. He frowned. Last night when they were investigating, she seemed serious, and now?

"Do you?" She asked again.

"Piper are you alright? Has the case gotten to you? Are you sick or something? You should go back if you aren't feeling-"

" _Do. You. Or. Do. You. Not?_ "

She sounded impatient. He nodded, "I do. I need it for a few meetings and events."

"Excellent. And some ridiculously expensive perfume?"

"Yeah?" It came out like a question.

"Good. We're heading back to your place." She spoke, turned around, and motioned for him to follow. Travis, who was there during all that, followed Piper and Malcolm down the stairs, and asked, "Piper, I know you. At least, I think I do. Though I'm not sure. But you behave like this only when you are somewhat close to solving the case. Are you? Right now?"

"Maybe yes, maybe no."

"Fine. Do I have to do something?"

"Oh, yes, run to the office and bring me one picture of the crime scene of every Black Jack case, including this, would you?" Piper asked. They had gotten to the car. Malcolm slid into the driver's seat and hoped that Piper didn't do this because she wanted to play dress up.

"And why exactly did you put me in this Armani suit in broad daylight when we could be investigating a murder case?" Malcolm asked her.

Piper tried her hardest not to think about how hot he looked in the suit as she picked up the expensive, tiny bottle of perfume and went near him. They were face to face, more like, chest to face, considering the fact that she was really short. Compared to him, at least. She looked him directly in the eye. Malcolm's breath hitched as he found himself staring into her huge, now cerulean blue eyes. This close, she looked even more pretty, if that was possible. It was literally like those scenes in the telenovelas and romance movies. Magical.

All of a sudden, Piper blinked. Not so magical anymore. The two looked away, and there it was, the awkward silence which always followed. Then, for her _investigation,_ she then sprayed the perfume on his chest. A lot of it. They started coughing.

"God! Why do you need that strong stuff?! To scare people away?"

"Normally, normal people don't use _that_ much of it. Now would you like to tell me why you made me put this on? If it weren't for Agent Zhang telling me to go with whatever you've said, I would've been utilizing my time by doing some actual detective work." Piper sighed, stepped back, and sighed again. Then she sat down on the sofa. "Anyways, we have 15 more minutes, and then 15 more minutes after that. Then you can get out of that suit. But for now," She patted the seat next to her, and then continued, "You may have a seat."

He sat down, and asked, "And?"

"So how did you become an FBI agent at the age of 21? Don't you people have thousands of courses to attend and exams to give?"

"Well, the minimum age is 23, but they... made an exception."

"Nope. They didn't. Your achievements did."

He looked down, and said something, it came out as a mumble, almost as if he was ashamed, "Yeah. That. Hey, how do you know?"

"Seriously? Stop underestimating me. You need to except the fact that I know everything. And also the fact that I am a 9 on the scale of awesomeness, even if it isn't a word. And that Zhang's computer is way too easy to hack. He should keep more security. At least the protection program that lady lawyer had, on that case," She sighed. She had the expression on her face that girls her age had when they thought about hot guys or clothes, Malcolm noted as he stared at her. She continued, "Now _that_ was some work, I had to stay up all night doing that, we couldn't ask the cyber department because, well, stuff like that is illegal, and they didn't have enough evidence. It was fun, though."

"So you hack into any one's personal files?"

"When I need something, yes. Oh, and government's official files too."

He shook his head, wondering how Agent Zhang had reacted to all that. Knowing Zhang, he probably would've thrown her out, but yet again, they needed her. And Malcolm suspected that Zhang did not know about her hacking in the first place.

"You knew the answer, still you asked me, huh?"

"Hey!" She huffed, "Don't blame me for trying to strike up some conversation."

"Sorry!" He quickly spoke, with his hands in the air in surrender position, and a cute smile on his face. She smiled back and said, "Tell me something about you that I don't know."

"Well... Where to start? I-" Piper's iPhone beeped, and she jumped up.

"Times up! Get up."

"Uh... What?"

"Get up, now. My theory was right. I know who the killer is. Now all you have to do is take me out for an extremely late lunch. And you are going out in a suit, so you might as well take me someplace fancy, not just McDonalds, kay?"

He stared at her, and nodded. Half the time, she didn't make sense. It would be foolish to start trying to figure her out when they were this close to figuring the case.

"Fine, then where do you want to go?"

"I'm the new neighbor, remember?"

He grinned and nodded.

-X-

Piper dove into her spaghetti. She was vegetarian. No meatballs for her.

Malcolm had brought her to a high end Italian restaurant famous for its pastas and breads. There were no pizzas, and Piper was glad. Last time she had tried a proper Italian pizza, it wasn't a nice experience. There was nearly no cheese. But the nicer part was that her father was with her and they were having a discussion on Piper's second favorite topic, 'American Pizza'. Her favorite topic for discussion was the Stockholm Syndrome and its different interpretation in different psychological cases, but unfortunately her father was not a big fan of that.

Hey, she could discuss that with Malcolm, he would surely appreciate an intellectual conversation. But some sagacious voice in her head told her to not talk about that.

You see, this was the reason Piper did not have friends. She talked about cognitive neuropsychology, which, by the way, was a branch of psychology that studies brain injury to infer normal cognitive function, while the other girls at school discussed Dylan O'Brien, lipstick shades, 50 Shades Of Grey (whatever that was) and some even maths. Therefore Piper focused on the thing in front of her, spaghetti. Wonderful, yummy spaghetti.

Meanwhile, Malcolm was facing his own problem. His mother was here, at the restaurant, with some of the lawyers who worked under her at her firm. Last time he talked to his mother, she was talking to him about politics. Hell, every time they met, they talked politics. It was their alternative to 'How's the weather?'. But every time Athena brought up the topic of dating, he'd say that he had work and leave the room.

"Uh... Piper? We have a little problem over here, my mother's here with her colleagues."

"What? Mrs. Chase is here? Where? Oh..." She turned around, and saw her. She was a beautiful woman in her late forties, with blonde hair which had streaks of white. "So... I take it you don't want to meet your mother. Alright then, we'll leave. Call Travis and ask him to call everyone for a meeting and bring that file I asked him, or his brother to bring."

"Right. You're finished?"

"Oh yeah. And because you're wearing the tuxedo, I'll pay."

"No you wouldn't, because I already did." She pouted, and then answered, "Fine. But next time, let me pay. It feels like we're on a date or something."

He blushed.

She smirked.

They walked to the door, and all of a sudden, she pressed her hand on his chest. Something along the lines of, _he is so freakingly well-built and rock hard!_ passed through her mind.

His eyes widened.

"Uh... Piper?" She slipped her hand into his shirt pocket, and brought out a tiny piece of paper.

 _Oh... So she wasn't feeling me up._

"Disappointed, Agent Chase?"

"Wha-n-no. Of course not."

He loosened his tie.

 _Why was it suddenly so hot in here?_

Apparently, just like in those goddamn cliche romance novels, Mrs. Chase saw all that drama unfold. In a flash, she was by their side. "Malcolm, dear? How lovely it is to see you here! And who is this lovely lady with you? I can't believe Malcolm kept you away from me, my love." The last part was directed towards Piper, of course. Piper smirked at Malcolm. S _he seemed to be doing that a lot, lately._

"Mom, this is Piper, and she's helping us with an important case. She's just a colleague."

"Oh, of course you're Piper! The genius who's been helping around! Agent Zhang consulted me before forming the agreement your father signed. Annabeth also talked about you, you know! It's simply wonderful to finally meet you. Oh, and you're so pretty! With beautiful eyes like these, and you're intelligent brain, men must be falling at your feet!"

Piper stood there speechless as Athena gushed on. She didn't even notice as Malcolm blushed tomato red. This was different for her. Athena was behaving like an actual, caring (also insert: clever, matchmaking) mother (also insert, again: who didn't want her son to die single and alone).

Piper hadn't been around actual, caring mothers since her own one died. She didn't know how to react. Fortunately, Malcolm understood the look in her eyes and came to her rescue, "Mother. It's been wonderful to have run into you. But we should go, now. We have work, and so do you."

Athena frowned at her son. "Fine, but Piper darling, you have to promise me that you'll come over the house for dinner sometime."

"Uh... Of course I will, Mrs. Chase. I will!" She replied awkwardly with an extra burst of awkwardness at the end. "Oh, call me Athena, dear. Now I've got to go, bye, love. Bye, Malcolm." After she went away, Malcolm glanced at Piper, who was still staring at Athena's retreating figure with a flustered look. "I'm sorry, usually my mother doesn't behave like this-"

"It's alright. She very sweet. And nice. I like her. Let's go. I'll wait in the car, you call Travis." Walking over to Malcolm's sleek black car, she wove a hand through her hair, and released a breathe she didn't know she was holding. If her mother was alive, would she do the same? Would she try to play the matchmaker? Would she? And would Piper be in this position if she did? Well, no. She'd be back in LA, spending time with her father and mother, like a normal family. As normal as it would get with having super famous parents, that is.

She crossed her arms over her chest as she waited for Malcolm to return, the car was parked away from the restaurant, so the street was empty. With her brain turning its nuts and bolt and buzzing, she heard a little crunch of leaves behind her. "Oh, good you're here, Malcolm," She started, blinking back some of her tears and turned around.

She frowned, there was no one there. She swore there was someone there.

"Piper, I talked with Agent Zhang, he's ready for the meeting. Personally, I think he's in for the meeting because the team hasn't been able to gather anything. So I hope that you have reached somewhere..."

This voice, Malcolm's voice, came from behind her. A look of bewilderment covered her face. Well... She definitely needed hearing aids. Or she needed to clear her head.

"Let's go, Malcolm."

He nodded. They reached the place, and it was almost four. And they just ate lunch. She swore under her breath. Work was screwing up with her schedule. Her dad would be unhappy. Of course, he'd let her work with the FBI to catch her a crazy serial killer who killed brunettes, but not taking meals at the correct times? His answer would be "We need to talk, missy."

Though she wasn't sure if Zhang exactly told her father what she did with the FBI. Tristan thought that it was some crash course with computers, not actual murderers. "Malcolm, I have to ask you for a favor."

"And what's that?"

"That when we enter the room, and I'd shout 'Restrain her' you'd leave whatever you're doing, and stop Mrs. Robinson from doing whatever she would do," Malcolm opened his mouth to say something, but Piper cut him off, "And you won't question me."

His eyes left the road for a moment, and he looked at her.

He nodded.


End file.
